We're very excited to finally unveil the ground grading functionality we've been working on for quite some time! Here are some key points about it:
Ground grading can be found in the third tab of Civil analysis - the first two tabs of the Civil analysis window allow you to indicate tables that have a slope issue or terrain collision issue and the third tab for Ground grading allows you to resolve both of those issues.
Active surface definition - so that we do no alter the existing terrain data you have, PVcase will create a copy of the that terrain and make alterations to it. That new terrain will be placed under the Proposed surface label and will be created when you select an area for grading. In the GIF below you can see indicative terrain points being created for the entire drawing (more terrain points are actually used than shown)
Notice the Active surface automatically switch from Existing to Proposed after area selection.
Grading to resolve collision issues - the ground grading functionality is tied to table pole lengths. In order to grade tables you need to set your required pole length range and PVcase will alter the terrain underneath and between adjacent tables to create a surface that would accommodate poles in that range.
Grading to resolve slope issues - for tables that have a slope issue the process is similar, only before executing the grade action we must first alter the table slope to a new value. The Set slope button changes the slope of the table object to be in accordance with your given value. After setting the slope the next step is to execute the Grade command to alter the surface underneath the tables that are now sloped differently.
Cut & fill calculation - apart from altering the surface underneath tables you can also get the value of the amount of earthworks required. That value shows up in the table for both the selected area's grade and also for the entire drawing if you have more that one area that's graded.
Active surface switch - a small switch with a huge impact. Since PVcase can accommodate two different terrain data at the same time - you can easily switch between your existing terrain and proposed (the one you graded). This switching also automatically updates piling information values so you can easily compare your pole length values before and after grading.
Surface comparison heatmap - at the final step we have the ability to quickly compare the existing and proposed grade surface. This allows you to visualize the grading work intensity.
Reset grade to start over - if you want to try out some different scenarios you can also reset any grading actions that were done for an area and start from scratch
Minimize required grading - in order to minimize the required ground grading you can also elevate your tables to a larger reference pole length value which in turn will increase the amount of pole lengths you need but in turn will reduce the required amount of grading.
To find out how to execute this quick analysis using PVcase check out this article.